


For People and Things (That Went Before)

by chibimono



Series: Policy Prohibits Fraternization [4]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Blind Soldier: 76 | Jack Morrison, Gabriel's POV, Good guy Gabriel Reyes, Hopeful Ending, M/M, Nanites, Post-explosion reunion, Talon agent Reaper, description of scars, description of sustained injuries, emotional synesthesia, mention of implied Gabriel/Liao, retelling of the Recall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-16
Updated: 2017-01-16
Packaged: 2018-09-17 20:46:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9343319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chibimono/pseuds/chibimono
Summary: Tasked with tracking down the elusive Solder:76, Reaper forcibly relives bittersweet memories that threaten to distract him from his mission of revenge.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AsheRhyder](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AsheRhyder/gifts).



> For Reaper76 week, Day 1: How we were.
> 
> Title taken from the lyrics of "In My Life" by The Beatles. A fitting song.
> 
> So many thanks to my buddy [Ashe Rhyder](http://archiveofourown.org/users/AsheRhyder/pseuds/AsheRhyder). Without their cheering, badass beta reading, and endless hours of teaming up for gameplay, this would still be just an idea in my head. Shhh, you're the best. No lies.

"He's getting in the way. He needs to be eliminated."

"I'll deal with him," Reaper says into his comm unit, the lazy growl of his masked voice hiding the bitter undercurrent of resignation.

He looks over the tablet's files again--poor security footage from Watchpoint: Grand Mesa, vague eyewitness accounts, video taken of the damage left behind. Everything points to this guy, this Soldier: 76, as being enhanced. Even his preferred call-sign is a blatant rip from the old Soldier Enhancement Program, originally codenamed Special Enhancement Project 76.

Gabriel Reyes would know this man, who ever he is, and that makes it personal. The only way the guy will have a merciful death is if Reaper does it himself. It's the least he could do.

It takes a few weeks of analyzing, and Soldier: 76 strikes twice in the meantime, but Reaper's able to pull together patterns. It takes less time than he thought, but it's mostly because the guy seems to be targeting some of the same points Reaper is subtly watching. Soldier: 76 is after what is left of Overwatch, raiding abandoned bases for supplies, destroying labs, and knocking off former agents. Of course Talon is pissed, seeing as how this Soldier is getting in and snatching up tech and intel right under their noses. Helix Securities, tasked with guarding the secrets of former the peacekeeping operation, is the only barrier Talon has yet to crack, and this Soldier has slipped past them all like a ghost.

"He's enhanced and he has ties to Overwatch," Sombra messages him. He knows this already, seen all the signs, but he's playing this close to his chest. He has to, to be this far inside Talon without them knowing his true identity, so he pretends he hasn't already noticed.

The thing is, there were only two people with full SEP treatment in Overwatch, and other than Gabriel, Jack Morrison was dead.

"I'll deal with him," Reaper growls as he mashes the comm button in reply. After he finds out who the hell this guy is.

++++++++++

The Soldier zigzags across North America, not once leaving the continent. It all seems like it's on a whim, until Reaper falls into step two paces behind. The guy trashes everything before he leaves, but Reaper used to know these hubs, carved a small hiding place for himself at every one he's had to stay, and has his own way of accessing things. Just because the monitors are destroyed, the local servers shot full of pulse munitions, doesn't mean they can't be accessed. A conveniently stashed tablet might need a charge and possibly a system update, but it's still linked in.

Zürich. Blackwatch. Lacroix. Talon. At every Watchpoint, Soldier hits the same searches, as if something new will pop at a different location. It's all linked to the same cloud database out of Gibraltar, but maybe he's hoping someone would have left him notes locally, perhaps?

By the fourth hub, Reaper realizes that Soldier _is_ expecting notes, or something like it, and from Gabriel Reyes himself. The Soldier is backtracking through the last holds frequented by the lost Blackwatch commander, as if looking for anything he left behind.

As if looking for _him_ , looking for what was left of _Gabriel_.

Rage flairs up in Reaper's belly. It's too late, he thinks. Too late to stop the plague that claimed Overwatch. Too late to save Jack. Too late now to save himself. Talon has sunk its claws in too deep, into too many strongholds. Reaper has lost himself in trying to find the root of it, and he'll be damned if he lets some other foolish asshole find it before he does, before he can burn it to its core.

Now that he knows where he needs to focus, Reaper is able to move in faster, close in quicker. The electrical fires are still burning at the hub in Ohio, a former medical laboratory. The biotic emitters have been raided. The remains of a hastily eaten meal left behind. Reaper just missed him by hours.

He has an idea of the Soldier's next move and rushes for it. He's getting somewhat low on energy, his nanites need a charge, but traveling on his own is faster. He doesn't have the time to scare up an emotional response out of someone, or to hide in the dark corners of a brothel or funeral home. He's not quite in full degrade yet, still somewhat functionally solid, so he doesn't see the need to wasting time feeding off of the emotional energies of others just yet. Besides, Reaper knows how terrifying he can be as a smoking wraith, and has drawn enough off the fear he creates to take down an entire room.

He reaches the hub in Seattle, a former West Coast recruitment and training facility, and slips in along the shadows. Reaper knows this place well, maybe too well. He recalls the mutiny that once echoed in these halls, agents he could barely trust pulling him down, beating him into what they hoped was submission. Talon showed its hand to him in person for the first time. If not for Jesse and Genji, there was no way he would've survived that, except... 

The nanites had crawled through his skin for longer than he realized. Not since his SEP days maybe, but some time before the loss of the Swiss headquarters.

He thinks maybe he wasn't fast enough, maybe he's just barely missed Soldier at this particular hub, when his nanites pick up traces of another person nearby. And hit him hard with the taste of nostalgia.

The synesthesia that comes with nanites that feed on the emotions of others can be jarring. He can feel the Soldier’s anger in the way his throat itches and eyes burn with the phantom taste of chili oil. His frustration feels like a tightening in Reaper's nose and sinuses, like a sneeze building but not letting go. The feelings are strong, and even from this distance, it boosts him a tick.

But under it all, he can sense the individual soul of the man, and homesickness leaves him reeling, flinging him back to a different time and place. To his kitchen at home in California, with his mother and his grandma, the last time he was home with his grandma alive.

A pot of oil heated on the stove, adding a greasy humidity to the air. His grandma was making _buñuelos_ and he could taste the warm, sweet dough, covered in a runny, sticky drizzle of honey like it was only yesterday. Grandma's _buñuelos_ were a Christmas treat when Gabriel was a child, but she spoiled him, making them for all special occasions, even when he was grown. Coming home on leave, his first trip home since he joined SEP, was definitely a special occasion. After four years, the program ended in an Omnic siege. They were separated to help search for survivors, and Gabriel didn't know by this point if Jack had made it out alive. He was so happy to be reunited with his family, but he ached for Jack.

"All you've talked about since you've come home is this Jack," his mom said, setting out cups of coffee.

Gabriel huffed, feeling like a middle schooler being pried at about his crush. "He was my roommate. I saw him every day. It's not like it meant anything." He hadn't wanted it to mean anything. Back then, what they shared, he thought it was just lust, touched-starved intimacy.

"You remind me of your Papa," his grandma said, wrinkles forming around her eyes as she smiled, looking so happy. "He came home from school every day, talking about the most beautiful girl in his class. I remember asking him once, if he maybe loved her. He told me, 'No, Mami. She's just a classmate.' He was just happy every day to be near her."

"So, what happened?" Gabriel asked around a fritter, licking the honey from his lips. Something in him wanted a happy ending, was looking for something hopeful. Anything to hold back the ache of Jack possibly being gone.

"He married her. They had you," she laughed sweetly, patting his cheek. Beside her, his mother smiles wistfully, her eyes glittering with thoughts of her beloved, long departed husband.

They each took one of his hands in their own, even with his fingers sticky from honey. " _Mijito_ ," his grandma said, like a quiet prayer, "I hope he's okay. I hope you find him again. Even if you don't love him now, you feel something for him. He made you happy, I can tell. You can't stop talking about him. Just like your Papa."

He's so startled by the full sensory memory, he drops his guard, loses himself to it. Nothing before has been this intense, stirring up more than just a series of idle tastes or sensations. Reaper is able to remember the feel of the very tablecloth under his fingers, the warmth of his grandma's hands, the bitterness of the coffee. He's so far down the rabbit hole he doesn't even register the firing of helix rockets in his direction.

They hit dead on, and if he was a regular man, it would be an instant kill. He's lucky for the tiny bit of feeding he got off of the Soldier's angers and frustrations at a distance. Even as he still goes into degrade, the little taste of energy keeps him from completely slipping into the ether. Unfortunately, he's unable to pull himself together enough to chase after the Soldier.

It's a long and painful crawl among the shadows to get to a populated area, where he can hide among the people and drink up their emotions. The waiting is the worst, leaving him trapped inside his own head, missing his grandma, his mom... Jack...

When he's able to find his solid form again, he's got a message from Widowmaker. He's expected at a checkpoint, with details of a mission incoming. Since he's already lost the Soldier for the time being, he doesn't argue as he heads in.

++++++++++

Her skin is blue and she puts off no energy for him whatsoever, a complete void of emotions. Yet she drags up memories of dinner parties, though no specific one; just home cooked meals with fancy dinnerware and the core team all around a long and decorated table. She smells like Gerard's cologne, leaves a buttery aftertaste of rich red wine on his tongue, and a faint sensation of tiny dinner bells ringing in his ears. She only knows him as Reaper now, but he's pretty sure she wouldn't recognize him as Gabriel anyway. He isn't sure what they did to Amélie, but he thinks she's no longer in there, in Widowmaker.

Part of him wonders if she could ever be unearthed from the brainwashing. He also wonders if she did break free, would it be better to kill her? Free her from reliving the horrors she's done before the truth of her remade existence set in? She was a sweet woman, warm and gentle with children, a little mischievous with those she considered friends, like Gabriel. He would understand if she couldn't live with herself, after the murder of her husband Gerard. If he had been the one to kill Jack...

It takes longer than he'd like to get there, but he finally meets with her in one of the abandoned stations of the old Metro Bilbao in northern Spain. Talon has managed to convert it to a small armory and a strike team is waiting for him. Widowmaker passes him a tablet with her reconnaissance work, lets him look it over. He'll be hitting Watchpoint: Gibraltar, his home away from home, once upon a time.

When the UN shut it all down, all the servers and databases that weren't destroyed at the other hubs and Watchpoints were consolidated, their files stored on the massive cloud servers in Gibraltar. They can be accessed for viewing anywhere with the proper pass codes. However, accessing and making changes are two different things. Any kind of overwriting has to be done on Gibraltar's servers themselves, including erasing agent files. Reaper finds it odd that Helix Securities hasn't been tasked with guarding the Watchpoint and the information inside, but according to Widowmaker's intel, the place does have a grounds-keeper of sorts.

"Sombra added a virus to the data grab," Widowmaker says as she hands him the tech-spike. "Make sure it's at one hundred percent before leaving so they can't revive the servers after. Talon wants it completely disabled."

He knows the halls he's about to invade like the back of his hand, much more so than the little hubs where he chased after the Soldier. After the beating his heart took in their last encounter, with the memory of his late grandma and a painful reminder of losing Jack, he's not sure he's ready to walk through the those corridors again. "If there's only one man there, why is a whole team even needed?"

"Fodder for any of the security protocols in place. Talon wants to make sure you'll get in and get out, and they expect radio silence until you're done, so no backup," she says, a cruel smirk curling around her lips. Reaper hates that he can't read a thing from her, his dear friend lost to the darkness.

She leaves him as his team sets out, moving south to Gibraltar. With the recon details in hand, he sends the so-called fodder team in to deal with the security measures. Reaper takes his time in following behind them, closing his eyes against the familiar backdrop of the Gibraltar coast at night. He expects to hear an echo of boots walking with his own, expects to turn and find tousled blond hair and soft blue eyes. He chokes for a moment, a lump high in his throat, as he remembers the sound of Jack's voice, clear as day.

_We'll figure this out, Gabriel. Don't we always?_

They did, but this time it was too late. He barely had the time to shove Jack out the door and lock it before laying over the bomb. He's tried to forget Jack's cries through his comm, his dying words-- _Gabriel, you asshole! Don't! I can't lose you! I lo-_ Sometimes the horror of it all comes back to haunt him in his sleep. If he sleeps.

The team is fairly decent about avoiding the motion detectors, but one of them still manages to signal the alarm. Talon's lackeys aren't the brightest by far, but intelligence isn't really important when they're disposable and meant to be a distraction. In bygone years, he could've managed this operation with just two others. Jesse and Genji, the only members of Blackwatch he ever needed. His boys. As long as Reaper functions, he'll do everything in his power to keep Talon from ever touching them again.

The lights cut out while they're occupied with the Watchpoint's guardian, allowing Reaper to move in. He gets his first taste of ozone and the oily clinging sensation of peanut butter stuck to the roof of his mouth, the ocean spray scent of a warm Mediterranean night watching the stars and howling like fools by the light of a full moon. The animalistic roar is all too familiar, and he can't help the smile forming under his mask, his laugh sounding menacing through his mask's filters. Of course it would be Winston. Who else would watch over Athena or guard Overwatch's scientific endeavors, now tightly sealed away? It doesn't make this any easier for Reaper, either; Jack had hand picked Winston, assigned him to his core team for the primate's scientific brilliance, and Gabriel had a great respect for him. They wouldn't have defeated Doomfist without Winston, and Gabriel and Jack both owed their lives to him for that.

This is just a job. Performing well will get him another step closer to the top of Talon's food chain, to the root of the problem, where he will burn it all down. Let the disposables deal with Winston, so he can get in and get out. Reaper moves with surety to the main panel of the server farm and slams the tech-spike into it. Athena announces the breach and even from down below, with a glass wall between them, Winston's rage burns Reaper's eyes to tears, irritates his throat raw. The burst of flash-fire emotion is like a junk food binge, his nanites loading up on a surge of power. The crash later will suck, but at least it will get him through this encounter and back to a checkpoint without needing to refuel.

When one of the lackeys flies through the glass, he knows he won't be able to leave without getting involved in the fight. Dammit, he didn't want to kill Winston. He owed it to Jack to keep what's left of his precious found-family alive for him.

With a deep inhale, Reaper tilts his head to crack his neck and settles into his persona. He jumps down and fires on Winston, painful but non-lethal shots to his armor, before clipping the hanging pod above to swing down and knock him out. He takes a moment to look around at the scattered heap of his Talon team and feels a small swell of pride. The once violence-shy lunar colony refugee has done well in defending himself, showing he had listened to Gabriel's lessons all those years ago.

He's hesitant to attack any further, stalls by looming and stalking menacingly. He is caught off guard by Winston's trick with the failed tech, but the concussive blast doesn't exactly hurt, just daze him. Thanks to the super-charge in his nanites, even the shock from the Tesla canon is more like a tickle. Reaper is left laid out on the floor as Winston runs to save Athena, already forgotten like the other members of his failure of a team. Jack would be so pleased, and Reaper doesn't have the heart in him to ruin Winston's victory. The data on those servers are precious, a means to save lives if the Petras Act is ever lifted. Lives Gabriel once was a part of saving. Lives Reaper now destroys.

A peace fills Reaper, one he hasn't felt in years. He lays there with his eyes closed and he can almost hear the bustle of agents around him. Jesse and Genji snickering as Jack calls for attention, with Angela shushing them. Lena and Winston cheerfully bantering while Torbjorn grumbles about being drawn away from work. Ana struggling to get a little Fareeha to sit still, only settling if she can sit on Rienhardt's shoulders. And Jack smiles at him, soft and sweet, a proud guardian, a father of something that was once so pure... Even at full strength, Reaper almost slips into the ether on his own, losing himself in bittersweet memories, fraying at the edges and slowly dissolving.

He startles out of oblivion as systems begin powering up around him. The lights are still out from the fight, but indicators are flashing on unbroken monitors. Damn. Not only did Reaper fail to get the agent list and shut down the servers, but now Winston is _using_ them. Winston is calling them all home, despite the threat of vigilante status.

A home Reaper doesn't belong to anymore. He takes to his wraith form and slips out into the night, following the shadows away from Gibraltar and to the next closest checkpoint.

The recall will be a heavy blow to Talon's plans, and Reaper welcomes it.

++++++++++

He takes his time reaching the checkpoint, like he's nursing his wounds and his pride, not his heart. He goes slinking around in slum apartment halls to recharge off the mix of sorrows, angers, and lusts permeating through the thin walls. He tries forgetting about Amélie lost underneath Widowmaker, about Winston welcoming everyone home, about Jack long buried. It's difficult, and he finds himself failing to let go of these thoughts over and over again. Nostalgia curls in his bones and doesn't want to leave him alone.

When he finally tunes in from his radio silence, Talon's ranks are in an uproar. Widowmaker is out on her own assassination operation. Several other high-ranking operatives are also tied up in missions, leaving Talon without the experience needed should an emergency arise.

How convenient that Soldier: 76 decided now was the time to deviate from his pattern, taking a detour south of the border.

The town of Dorado is home to the power company LumériCo, and the CEO and former _presidente_ Guillermo Portero has enjoyed his time in Talon's care. They've paid him over the years to use his _Los Muertos_ gang to acquire and traffic weapons. Talon's protected his assets and kept negative press out of the papers, keeping Portero on the pedestal his people raised for him as a hero from the Omnic Crisis.

Something must have tipped the Soldier off for him to change up his pace so quickly. He rolled into Dorado like a surprise thunderstorm, _Los Muertos_ a lightning rod for his fury. For two nights, the back streets of the quiet town were a nightmare of gang warfare all thanks to one man. It drew in the media, brought attention from miles around. A few exposed emails were dropped on the laps of a few reporters and detectives... and in less than a week, Talon lost _Los Muertos_ , Portero, and Dorado.

Because Reaper hadn't properly dealt with the Soldier to begin with, and their best agents were seemingly occupied, Talon is opening the pool to all comers, with a massive bounty on the Soldier's head.

The agents are after him like rabid dogs, looking to tear him apart whether or not Talon wants him alive. Current reports state that Soldier is heavily injured and exhausted, his actions getting sloppy. Reaper grits his teeth against a growl, more than a little pissed at the implied incompetence in his skills, as well as the usurping of his quarry.

As if reading his mind, Sombra sends him a message. "Welcome back. I can call them off if you'd like to finish what you started. Feel the need to redeem yourself?"

Reaper's fuck up at Gibraltar will tarnish his credibility in the ranks for the foreseeable future. This could be his saving grace in the eyes of those higher up. He's calculating the possibility of bringing Soldier in alive, the possibility of throwing Soldier down in front of them personally and getting the chance to see a face, a name. The chance to dig in closer to the root.

He wants this. He _needs_ this. This has gone beyond the mere curiosity of Soldier: 76's identity and the courtesy of a merciful death at hands of a former squad mate This could be his ticket to the top, his chance to finally get inside. Blow them away, like they did to him and Jack. He could finally see this long game end and find a way to die, satisfied in his revenge.

"Give me coordinates. I'll deal with him," Reaper hisses, a fire building within.

His tablet pings with a map, pinned with locations and times of every sighting reported by the agents in tracking Soldier. His eyes follow the beeline Soldier made back into the States, sees the points where he's doubled back and tried throwing off their tail on him, but still heading in the same general direction. Reaper's gut instinct clenches with the theory of where Soldier might be headed.

"I've got thirty-six hours of red herrings, but that's all I can give you," Sombra says. "Good luck."

Reaper trusts his analysis; it got him through a war, got him through years of special ops. He was able to get close to Soldier before, he just can't let himself be distracted like that again. His gut is telling him to head to the ruins of Special Enhancement Project 76.

Reaper remembers how the Omnic staff turned on them that day so long ago, the long siege on the main compound, and the rescue. He remembers flying away in the helicopter, watching the Air Force come through and carpet bomb the base, and the desperate hope that Jack made it out alive. His first thought at seeing the base in the distance is to check if his barracks still stand, if there is still a lingering of Jack in their old dormitory. How is it that this Soldier: 76 has become a catalyst, causing Reaper to backtrack to all these points that now haunt him? He's been so consumed with revenge, with taking down Talon, that he's pushed all these memories aside, never took the time to grieve. Seven years and it feels like it's come back to bite him in the ass, all thanks to this enhanced vigilante with a hard-on for the remains of Overwatch.

It eats up a good nine hours of his allotted time to get to the old base, but he's pretty sure he made the right call. The place is practically reclaimed, with vines taking over what is left of the structures and tall grass. He can see that someone recently pushed their way through, not bothering to hide their tracks, blood on the grass obviously recent. Reaper curses under his mask as he follows the trail right to his old barracks, the building mostly intact after all these years.

He finds himself lingering on the outskirts of the building, letting his nanites scent for a living being. He wants to make sure he can keep a hold of himself, that the memories won't drag him under to make him an easy target again. He walks the perimeter of the building before he finally catches something, and it's faint and wavering. Again, it's sticky honey and humid, but he won't let himself think of his grandma, of Jack. There's also the senses of fear frosting like frigid air in his lungs, of hot tar roads in the summer that make up bitter sorrow, and of pain manifesting like grinding steel wool with his molars. He grounds himself with the emotions before moving onward, taking in the phantom sensations, and feeling the slow crawling rise of the energy it gives him.

Reaper slips into the building’s shadows as they lengthen with the evening sun. He knows these halls, thirty years after the fact and he could probably still navigate them with his eyes closed. He finds and follows the handprints and smears of blood on the walls, a dead biotic emitter, the Soldier's discarded face mask, vomit that looks more like old coffee grounds than it ever should. It's as if the Soldier is on his last reserves, the wall the only thing keeping him up when he pushed himself further down the corridors. The closer Reaper gets, the stronger the emotions should feel, but they fade in and out far too much; the Soldier is barely hanging on to consciousness. The extent of the injuries must be far worse than the other agents thought, if an Enhanced is suffering this badly. A mercy kill would be a blessing at this point, but it just means Reaper won't have a fight on his hands bringing the Soldier in.

There's a growing unease in Reaper as he treks through the halls. The dorm doors all have automatic locks, keyed to the biometrics of their occupants. Reaper is fully expecting the need to dissolve into a wraith and take to the vents to find this asshole, but he finds himself weaving an oh-so-familiar path in the eerie quiet of the decaying building, the trail taking him closer and closer to his former residence.

The door looks just like all the others, plain brushed steel, but the trail stops here, with a bloody swipe of fingers over the biometric scanner.

The door looks just like all the others, but it's _his_ door. _His_ and _Jack_ 's.

He can't seem to help that his guard slips and all he can taste is fried dough smothered in honey, oil-muggy air, and bittersweet heartache. Somewhere, someone has planned this cruel joke for him, has led him back to this place, back to square one, to completely crush him. He expects to open the door and find Jack, hale and whole and smiling, but he knows without a doubt he's just going to find a lonely, bitter, old soldier slowly dying on the floor. It doesn't stop the what-ifs and should-haves from slamming into him-- _he should have told Jack about sleeping with Liao_ , _what if he had gotten to Zürich sooner_ , _he should have told Jack he loved him_ \--bowling him over with regrets.

He howls in the darkness of the corridor, venting his pain and frustration and grief. Caustic rage takes over, burning like a fire through his nanites, fraying his edges into a massive shadow wraith. He is an angel of death! And nothing--not an old soldier, not his strongest memories, not even petty emotions--is going to stand in the way of his revenge! His gauntlet fades away to smoke, allowing him to touch a flesh hand to the biometric scanner, further smearing the blood there. As the door slides open for him, he swells and flows into the room like a dark fog, rolling along the floor and walls.

He finds the body of the Soldier on the floor of the bunk-room, his nanites quiet save for the faint honeyed taste of his core being. It’s as if he crawled for the bunk, crawled until he just couldn't anymore, and struggled to roll over into a recovery position to make sure his airways stayed clear in case he vomited while unconscious. A stray tendril of nanites reaches to flick on the overhead light as Reaper circles him. He takes in the bullet holes to his armor, the bloody mess of his side... the familiar curled hunch of his shoulders... the jawline he had traced with his eyes, his fingers, his lips so many times he knew it by heart, despite the stubble and bruising... an unacquainted scar slashed over those lips, but he knew them, he _knows_ that mouth...

No...

Sucking the black vapors into himself to become solid once more, Gabriel sheds his hood and jacket, his weapon belt, his mask, letting Reaper fall away like smoke. With his now bare hands, he reaches out slowly, expecting his hands to go through the man before him like an illusion, a dream. He touches his hand, a wrist for a pulse, his neck to double check. It's reedy, feeble, but still there. His breath is shallow, but fast, a strained wheeze on the inhale and an occasional pained whine with his exhale. He's feverish without sweating, so he is more than likely dehydrated.

Field training kicks in and Gabriel runs his hands over the Soldier, checking for wounds. He finds countless bruises and abrasions where the armor was lacking. The right side of his jacket is peppered with gashes and underneath is a bandage caked with old, almost black blood. A blast wound, by the look of it, with his ribs fractured under his armor, if not broken. There's probably shrapnel in his side, not too deep, but deep enough to continue bleeding sluggishly and very likely infected. Gabriel has a fleeting thought of how it will match the shrapnel wounds from a long ago injury on the man's other side, if it's... if it's really...

With gentle fingers, Gabriel searches the visor for a release, slipping it from the Soldier's face. He can see the ends of the scar that slashes at an angle over the man's face from around the visor, but he isn't prepared for the scarification underneath. Where there was once his right eye, now instead is a burned, rough mass of skin. There is no doubt in Gabriel's mind that his tactical sight piece embedded into his face in the explosion long ago, melting there, destroying the eye under the fused eyelid, even leaving a few burns over his ear. He tries checking the pupil of the other eye, but even the left one is damaged; milky and pale instead of a deep sky blue.

He's underweight, his hair has gone white and begun to recede, his skin pale. He is no longer the tawny, solid man of Gabriel's bittersweet memories.

But he is _alive_.

"Jack...?" Gabriel whispers into the silence of their dorm, his hand tenderly cupping his bruised cheek. Jack doesn't move, doesn't respond as Gabriel shifts him over his lap, into his arms. He doesn't have the supplies he'd need to extract the shrapnel or stitch Jack up. He could probably find him water, but he worries leaving Jack alone.

This is his Hell, Gabriel thinks. He died in Zürich, and will forever live out the nightmare of revenge for his fallen lover, only to find his lover has been alive just in time to watch him die again. He supposes that would be a fitting afterlife for him, for all the lives he's taken, but not if Jack has to suffer it, too.

When Gabriel runs his fingers along Jack's white hair, matted from blood and sweat, Jack starts to stir. Gabriel can sense him coming around; the nanites filling him with the tearing, grinding feel of pain in his jaws and a spike of frostbite in his chest signaling panic.

"I got you, Jackie, you're safe," he soothes, hoping Jack can hear him, can recognize him.

There's a burst of cinnamon and sugar in Gabriel's mouth, a vague tingle of sweet grit over his lips and tongue. He's never had that sensation before, doesn't know what emotion it equates to. But he wants to. He needs Jack to live so he can feel it again. He's just getting a faint hint of it, but it's filling him with something warm, driving his nanites to full charge and then some. He feels like something is knitting the nanite swarm of his body together, filling in all the micro gaps in between them. For the first time in as long as he can remember, Gabriel feels whole, feels human.

Jack's eye opens slightly, but the pale blue tracks nothing. "Gab..ri.el...?"

"Yeah, butterbread, it's me," Gabriel says, a tenderness coloring his voice as he cradled Jack gently in his arms.

"Funny..." Jack huffs a laugh even as he struggles with breathing, his voice a grating, raspy sound, "thought maybe... I'd see a blinding light... Or at least... your face..."

"You're not dying, baby. I won't let you." The endearment is foreign on his tongue, but feels right, feels like he should've said it years ago.

The sweetness of the cinnamon and sugar, the grit of it along his gums, becomes stronger... Just as the other sensations begin to fade. Even the honeyed humid warmth.

Jack whimpers in pain, wheezes a little with his rusty whisper. "Tired, Gabe... miss you..."

A frantic urgency runs through Gabriel, and he finds himself shaking. He doesn't know how to keep Jack from slipping away, from losing him completely. "I've missed you, too. More than I can ever say. That's why you gotta live for me. Please...!"

Everything leaves Gabriel, all but a faint trace of honey. He can't seem to breath as he panics, checking Jack for his pulse, that he's still breathing. Jack's barely there, slowly draining away. Gabriel hugs him close, calls his name, begs him to stay.

Not again. He can't lose him again.

He's got at least twenty-four hours before Sombra's timeframe is up, but possibly less before he loses Jack completely. Determination has him getting to his feet, cradling Jack close in a bridal carry. He takes off out of their old dorm room and through the darkened halls, his nanites burning through some energy to give off a faint, icy glow, helping avoid any possible obstacles. The main compound is mostly rubble, but Gabriel searches through it anyway, hoping for any kind of working terminal. He lays Jack down against a wall and takes apart a partially intact console, digging around inside. He uses his spare comm power source to splice into the console. It's just enough juice to get the system to come to life and allow him to spam old pass codes at the Overwatch servers for a solid ten minutes. He hopes it’s enough to get Athena's attention, that maybe Winston will want to look into it. His only other option is to terrorize the closest town, but that would mean leaving Jack alone.

He carries Jack through the ruins to what's left of the medical bay and hunts around in the dark for anything that will sustain Jack until he can find further help. A few biotic emitters tumble out of a collapsed cabinet. He uses them sparingly, the golden glow the only light in the fallen structure. He curls up with Jack on a dusty old cot in the meantime, staying close and giving him any warmth he can spare. He talks quietly, whispers all the pet names he can think of. He doesn't know if Jack can hear him or even tell if he's there, but Gabriel won't leave him just in case he can.

In eight hours, he's completely out of any further tricks. Just as he's thinking the end could come at any time, he hears a transport off in the distance. Gabriel's too afraid to hope that it could be help. He leaves a kiss to Jack's feverish forehead, promises he won't be gone far, before he heads out to see who's approaching.

Reaper cloaks him again in a swirl of black smoke, shotguns forming in his hands. He won't take any chances, not with Jack's life in the balance, and advances with intent to strike.

The sense of ozone and moonlit nights filters through the transport and Gabriel could cry.

 _Winston_.

He's joined by two people; gently tickling feathers and taste of sterile plastics, and rusted, sun warmed metal with a stein of German doppelbock.

He fires on the transport before the drop-door even opens, making sure he has their full attention. Reinhardt comes out sans-armor but with his shield already up, the hard-light of it casting Winston and Angela in a soft blue glow. Gabriel's never been so grateful to see them.

He can taste the hot burn of Winston's rage, overwhelming in comparison to the sensations the other two put off. His lunge is expected and Reaper disperses into a wraith. He does his best to keep Winston's eyes on him and hope the others will follow as he kites them to the main building. Embracing his persona for all he's worth, Reaper mocks them and laughs menacingly, guiding them through the safer halls, all the way back to the med bay.

He's far enough ahead of them that he can steal a moment, but only a moment, to slip his mask aside to lay a final kiss to Jack's forehead. Fading into the shadows, he waits as Winston charges into the room, with Angela fluttering in on his heels and Reinhardt covering their rear. The ape growls and turns to leave, but Angela's gentle hand touches his shoulder, holds him back.

"There's a dying man, Winston," she says, lighting her Caduceus Staff. Jack glows brightly, and for a moment, he looks blond again, golden again. It must catch her attention because she gasps, her delicate fingers covering her mouth. " _Mein gott_!"

"It can't be..." Reinhardt says, disbelief and awe in his voice.

Winston shuffles forward, looking over Jack. "How...?" he asks, glancing back to Angela for answers.

She shakes off the surprise and squares her shoulders. "He needs urgent attention. Help me get him to the transport so I can stabilize him. If he pulls through... we can ask him then."

Angela keeps her staff targeted on Jack as Reinhardt gently lifts him in his arms. Winston stays behind and looks to the shadows, his eyes narrowed and calculating. He leaves to join the others after a moment, on defense as they take in their old friend.

From the darkness, Reaper watches them take off. As they move farther and farther into the distance, he feels himself slipping more and more into the ether, dissolving away. He's gone completely to vapor on a final sigh, one of sweet relief instead of bitter grief.

Overwatch is back and Jack is alive.

Gabriel thinks that maybe he doesn't have to survive on revenge alone anymore.

++++++++++

Thanks to the cinnamon sweet boost he fed off of Jack, Gabriel has the reserves to come back into his solid form whenever he pleases. He drifts for a few days, considering the new information he's gained, and how he should continue. He still wants Talon destroyed, but now he has a possibility for more resources.

And Jack. He has Jack again.

He has to travel into the nearest city to recharge his comm before he can use it. He picks the busiest place, a strip mall in the evening hours, to keep Talon from pin-pointing his location once he cuts it on. He knows he's in trouble, his second failure in a row, but he wants to see if there are further reports about Soldier: 76 coming in.

When he turns it on, his signal stays local, and for a moment he thinks it's broke.

"I can't tell if you're brave or stupid," cuts into his earpiece.

"Sombra."

"You didn't just let him go, you let Overwatch take him."

Reaper has nothing to say, no way to defend himself. She must have tipped off the higher-ups, and he's waiting for the agents to swarm him.

"I can cover this. It's going to be hard, but I can do it."

He blinks, unable to process. "What?"

"Look, _jefe_ , I don't know how you are able to call in the old guard from Overwatch, but... I'm thinking maybe we can, I dunno. Collaborate?"

Overwatch is back. Jack is alive. And now, Reaper has a friend on the inside.

He feels a smile curl around his lips. The voice filter in his mask makes him sound a little sultry as he asks, "What do you have in mind...?"

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr as [littlethingofevil](http://littlethingofevil.tumblr.com).  
> I share an Overwatch sideblog with Ashe Rhyder at [badsleeptwins](http://badsleeptwins.tumblr.com).  
> This series has it's own tumblr at [policyprohibitsfraternization](http://policyprohibitsfraternization.tumblr.com).
> 
> Thank you for reading!


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